Insect Diversity in the Fava Beans

The first day of spring--Tuesday, March 20--yielded a diversity of insects in the fava beans planted in the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven, a half-acre bee friendly garden adjacent to the Harry H. Laidlaw Jr. Honey Bee Research Facility on Bee Biology Road, University of California,Davis.

A flurry of insects joined the honey bees: ladybugs, a blow fly, a stink bug, an alfalfa butterfly, European paper wasp and scores of aphids. 

Fava beans (Vicia faba), one of the world's oldest cultivated crops and native to the Mediterranean region, are also known as broad beans, horse beans, pigeon beans, and the like. 

"In North America, Canada is perhaps the largest producer of fava beans since they produce best in cool summer areas," write San Joaquin County Farm Advisors Gary Hickman and Mick Canevari in a Family Farm Series publication of the UC Davis Small Farm Center. "Minnesota and the lake states produce small acreages. In California, fava beans are grown as seed crops along the coast from Lompoc to Salinas and in the Northern Sacramento Valley, but in other areas of the state they are grown mostly as a cover crop or for green manure."

You can learn more about fava beans in the UC Davis Small Farm Center publication. Meanwhile, the insects hanging out in the Häagen-Dazs Honey Bee Haven are definitely favoring the fava beans.